Policies Your Business Should Evaluate

As many businesses at the Lake of the Ozarks gear back up or are planning to do so soon, this may be a good time to evaluate existing policies. Ensuring your business policies are 100% updated and accurate can help make a difficult time, like many businesses are facing, a little easier to handle. Take this time to evaluate your current policies that impact employees and make any needed updates or changes as you and your business evolve to this new business environment.


It's recommended to review human resources policies to make sure that policies and practices are consistent with public health recommendations and are consistent with existing state and federal workplace laws.

Sick Leave Policy

  • Ensure that sick leave policies are flexible and consistent with public health guidance and that employees are aware of and understand these policies.
  • Maintain flexible policies that permit employees to stay home to care for a sick family member or take care of children due to school and childcare closures.
  • Additional flexibility might include giving advances on future sick leave and allowing employees to donate sick leave to each other.
  • Employers that do not currently offer sick leave to some or all of their employees may want to draft non-punitive “emergency sick leave" policies.
  • Employees who have symptoms (i.e., fever, cough, or shortness of breath) should notify their supervisor and stay home.
  • Sick employees should follow CDC-recommended steps. Employees should not return to work until the criteria to discontinue home isolation are met, in consultation with healthcare providers and state and local health departments.
  • Employees who are well but who have a sick family member at home with COVID-19 should notify their supervisor and follow CDC recommended precautions.

Physical Distancing Policies

  • Discourage workers from using other workers’ phones, desks, offices, cashier stations or other work tools and equipment, when possible. If necessary, clean and disinfect them before and after use.
  • Physical distancing should be implemented if recommended by state and local health authorities. Think about what this means for break rooms, cafeterias, shift meetings, group tasks, client meetings, etc.
  • Review your policies or create new ones for telecommuting from home, flexible work hours, staggering shifts, meeting requirements, and travel options where applicable.

Work from Home Policy

If your team has been working from home, it may become a more permanent situation. 
  • Establish work from home hours that work for your business and provide guidance for timekeeping and reporting time worked. 
  • Provide IT support. Ensure your employees are equipped and properly prepared with everything they may need to successfully work from home. 
  • Streamline Communication. If you don't have a clear communication method in place, it's time to line out what type of communication methods are expected.

Many of the above Suggestions are Excerpts from the CDC website.

Now that you have a good idea of a few of the policies that may need to be updated or created, you're ready to analyse your business policies. Our Lake of the Ozarks chamber has a number of business resources readily available for our Lake Area Chamber member! Contact us today to learn how we can help as you transition to a new way of conducting business, both internally and externally.  


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